If one film exists
as a sort of blueprint for the mock documentary, it is No Lies,
even though it has little to do with the films that followed
it. It is at once the simplest and the most complex of all mock
documentaries: its scope is small, its duration is brief, and
its filming is technically uncomplicated. Yet, at the same time,
it poses larger questions about the nature of the documentary:
Can a documentary really tell the truth, and, if it can, how
can we know?No Lies posits itself as a
documentary in the vérité mode. Dirk Eitzen, in
his article "When Is a Documentary? Documentary as a Mode
of Reception," neatly sums up the filmic cues that identify
No Lies as a documentary:"The film scrupulously
copies the look of a vérité documentary. The camera
is handheld and the camerawork is a bit awkward, the rooms are
unevenly lit, there is no nondiegetic sound, and the films consists
of what appears to be a single unbroken take. ... The acting
in the film is impeccableas naturally self-conscious (or
self-consciously natural) as a 'real' vérité performance."It is hard to characterize
what makes a performance "real," but I, like Eitzen,
believe that the performance of the two players in the film 
Leverington in particular  is of the utmost important in
fooling the audience into thinking that the film is documenting
an actual event. Leverington progresses from bemused to slightly
exasperated to visibly upset to tearfully distraught in the course
of a fifteen-minute film, exhibiting range that Meryl Streep
can only dream of. In fact, Meryl Streep could never have played
this role, largely because she is Meryl Streep. A recognizable
face would have spoiled the illusion instantly.What else about No Lies makes
it so believable? There are the casual references to real-life
people and thingsthe two characters' mutual friends, Night
of the Hunter, New York City geography  that lend the film
an air of authenticity. I would also argue that the very subject
matter that Block has chosenone woman's rape  pushes
the film more toward the real than to the fictional. Rape is
rarely presented lightly in films; it could conceivably be on
e of the societal problems on which Frederick Wiseman himself
would turn his camera  it has that kind of "institutional"
power. Treating a dire subject in a matter-of-fact manner is
characteristic of the vérité style. More explicitly,
cinema vérité is known for presenting a controversial
subject in a matter-of-fact style that allows viewers to draw
their own conclusions after being presented with "objectively
presented" evidence.But, as mentioned above, No
Lies is more than just a critique of the vérité
style. When the credits appear at the end of the film and provide
the only clue that the film is a "fake"  not
a "real"  documentary, the first-time viewer
may be more than a little puzzled. Eitzen writes that the film
adheres so rigorously to documentary form that first-time viewers
who were unaware of the film's true nature often become "visibly
disturbed" at how the character of the filmmaker treats
the woman. Upon being told that it is a fiction film, these same
people redirect much of their anger to Mitchell Block, the man
who made the film. "Viewers now feel angry at having been
duped," he writes. Eitzen attributes this anger to the fact
that the film lies about its true nature. It pretends to be a
documentary, but is not. He states that No Lies is "a fiction
film about rape, but it is a documentary about documentaries."But No Lies is unusual among
mock documentaries, as it has the power to enrage its viewers
by its central deception. Also, its principal goal is to dupe
the audience, something not found in such extreme measures in
later mock documentaries (though Man Bites Dog (1991) and Forgotten
Silver (1996) come close). Most of the other mock documentaries
discussed here, however shocking and arresting they may appear,
are played largely for comedy. Why, then, have I identified No
Lies as a sort of blueprint for mock documentary when its intentions
are so dramatically different from those of its predecessors?
Partially because intentions are not as important as the subversion
of the documentary form, and partly because No Lies, like the
other mock documentaries I will discuss, leaves us with an important
lingering question: Could it actually have happened?